Feds: Calif. Water Crisis Isn't Washington's Fault - Arnie blames federal environmental restrictions

[Kadie]

Sep 3, 2009 5:27 pm US/Pacific
Feds: Calif. Water Crisis Isn't Washington's Fault

FRESNO, Calif. (AP) ― Top Obama administration officials are taking California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to task for blaming the state's water crisis on federal environmental restrictions.

The governor sent a letter to Washington Wednesday demanding a response to "catastrophic impacts" he said were caused by environmental rules that have slashed water deliveries.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke countered Thursday that a three-year drought mostly is to blame for the state's water shortages, which have caused cities to ration supplies and farmers to abandon crops.

The officials also said they are exploring scientific reviews of the restrictions, which were designed to protect fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

http://cbs13.com/local/Feds.Calif.Water.2.1163220.html

[villager]

1. Thanks, Salazar -- let's review the "restrictions" and not Big Ag's water wastage...

At least they provided a tepid rhetorical rebuke to Arnie.

About as much as we can expect, I guess...

[rfranklin]

2. Want water? Turn off lawn sprinklers, empty pools, close...

golf courses, stop sparying water into the air on acres and acres of desert where they grow almost inedible vegetables, etc.

[underpants]

3. Hmm last time California had troubles with a utility supply problem......

Who was that again????

"Burn, baby, burn. That's a beautiful thing," a trader sang about the massive fire.

"He just f---s California," says one Enron employee. "He steals money from California to the tune of about a million."

"Will you rephrase that?" asks a second employee.

"OK, he, um, he arbitrages the California market to the tune of a million bucks or two a day," replies the first.
---
"They're f------g taking all the money back from you guys?" complains an Enron employee on the tapes. "All the money you guys stole from those poor grandmothers in California?"

"Yeah, grandma Millie, man"

"Yeah, now she wants her f------g money back for all the power you've charged right up, jammed right up her a------ for f------g $250 a megawatt hour."

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/06/01/eveningnews/main620626.shtml

[MisterP]

4. there's so many silly "Congress-created Dust Bowl" signs on the I-5

most of them, mind you, are carefully tilled and obviously weeded; the un-irrigated areas around them, like the hills, are covered in grass
it's like they have no idea what a "Dust Bowl" even means